Review of Ghost in the Shell (1995) by Winston J — 02 Sep 2008

'Ghost In The Shell' (1995) by director Mamoru Oshii was a real butt-kicker for its time and brought renewed interest to Japanese Animation from North American film critics, long after the landmark emergence of Akira (1988). The highly cerebral and detailed scriptwriting brought raves from some critics, while the sometimes altered translated English-dubbed version brought baffled reviews from others.

While there are some great animated cinematic-styled action sequences, the film is still also an intellectual and philosophical mystery maze with characters struggling with the meaning of survival in a cybernetic world - themes that would years later influence and inspire the Wachowski brothers as they explored similar themes in 'the Matrix' trilogy.

Along with possibly being one of the first original and sophisticated cyber-mystery thrillers, 'Ghost in the Shell' was also one of the first anime that appeared to integrate the old ink, cell, and paint methods into computer CGI digital graphics thoroughly and successfully to a seamless level of cinematic film mastery.

(Back in the 80's, 'Akira' was still heavily using cell graphics and original BG paintings, while other anime in the 80's like 'the Lensmen" and 'Phoenix 2772' still had CGI technology in its underdeveloped early stages - the differences between CGI and Cell animation could be easily observed by the viewer.).

Kanji Kawai's striking operatic music beautifully enriches and enhances the mood of 'Ghost in the Shell'. The music classically and digitally bridges the new with the old.

Still, the qualitative uniqueness of the movie comes down to its detailed and highly complex science fiction screenplay, which is similar in sophistication and spirit to the ones that exists in films like 'Blade Runner' and '2001 A Space odyssey' (and also to some limited degree to Pixar's new 'Wall-E'). These are the type of films that force the viewers to think at times while going along for the ride. (And it appears that films like these just don't come along very often.).

But if that gets too boring for some viewers there's still always enough stylish but brutal butt-kicking by Major Motoko Kusanagi and Batou to keep any viewer tuned into the cyberpunk thriller right to the very end.

***.